Overview (4)

Mini Bio (1)

Born in New York City to legendary screen star Henry Fonda and New York socialite Frances Seymour Brokaw, Jane Seymour Fonda was destined early to an uncommon and influential life in the limelight. Although she initially showed little inclination to follow her father's trade, she was prompted by Joshua Logan to appear with her father in the 1954 Omaha Community Theatre production of "The Country Girl". Her interest in acting grew after meeting Lee Strasberg in 1958 and joining the Actors Studio. Her screen debut in Tall Story (1960) (directed by Logan) marked the beginning of a highly successful and respected acting career highlighted by two Academy Awards for her performances in Klute (1971) and Coming Home (1978), and five Oscar nominations for Best Actress in They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969), Julia (1977), The China Syndrome (1979), The Morning After (1986) and On Golden Pond (1981), which was the only film she made with her father. Her professional success contrasted with her personal life, which was often laden with scandal and controversy. Her appearance in several risqué movies (including Barbarella (1968)) by then-husband Roger Vadim was followed by what was to become her most debated and controversial period: her espousal of anti-establishment causes and especially her anti-war activities during the Vietnam War. Her political involvement continued with fellow activist and husband Tom Hayden in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In the 1980s she started the aerobic exercise craze with the publication of the "Jane Fonda's Workout Book". She and Hayden divorced, and she married broadcasting mogul Ted Turner in 1991.

Is the subject of an erroneous urban legend. When Vassar was a women's college, the story goes, Jane Fonda refused to wear the elegant white gloves and pearls that were the attire for the daily Tea in the Rose Parlor. When confronted, Fonda returned to the parlor wearing the gloves and the pearls, and nothing else.

Arrested at Cleveland Airport, Ohio after allegedly kicking patrolman Robert Pieper and customs agent Edward Matuszek in the groin and upper leg during their struggle to detain her upon finding 105 bottles containing some 2,000 capsules in her luggage. The star spent ten hours in a cell at Cuyahoga County Jail and was released on $6,000 personal bond. A federal drug smuggling charge was dropped once the substances were identified as vitamins and prescribed amounts of Dexedrine, Valium and Compazine. For lack of evidence, a federal assault charge pressed by Matuszek was dropped too, since the supposed 'assault' occurred when he chased Fonda into the ladies room. Pieper filed a $100,000 personal injury lawsuit against her in civil court that was eventually dismissed at his attorney's request. [November 1970]

Her birth was the cause of some interruptions during her father's filming of Jezebel (1938) with Bette Davis.

In March 2001 it was announced that Fonda had donated $12.5 million to Harvard University's School of Education for the creation of a gender studies center dedicated to examining how boys and girls learn differently. Her donation was reportedly the largest in the school's history to that date.

Shortly after her divorce from Ted Turner, she announced she had become a born-again Christian. Speculations are that this may have played a part in their separation, since Ted Turner has expressed highly critical opinions on religion in general.

The suicide of her socialite mother Frances Ford Seymour was kept from her as a teenager, and she was told that she'd died of heart failure. Household newspaper and magazine subscriptions were canceled, and the staff and student body of Fonda's high school were instructed not to discuss the incident. Fonda learned the truth months later while leafing through a movie magazine in study hall.

Her out-of-retirement movie, Monster-in-Law (2005) came out the same time as her autobiography, "My Life So Far" and the same time her workouts are re-released to DVD format in stores.

Protested alongside fellow actresses Sally Field and Christine Lahti, and playwright Eve Ensler urging the Mexican government to re-investigate the slayings of hundreds of women in Ciudad Juarez, on the Mexico-Texas border. [February 2004]

In 1982, she accepted the Oscar for "Best Actor in a Leading Role" on behalf of her father Henry Fonda, who wasn't present at the awards ceremony.

Of the Oscar-winning father-daughter pairs, she and her father are one of two pairs (the other is Hayley Mills/John Mills) where the daughter won an Academy award before the father did. Hayley Mills' Oscar was an honorary award for Pollyanna (1960), "...[T]he most outstanding juvenile performance during 1960". Juveniles were not allowed to compete for Oscars until the late 1960s, when the juvenile award was abandoned.

She and her father were the first father-daughter pair to be Oscar-nominated the same year. [1982]

Passed on the title role in Norma Rae (1979), which won a Best Actress Oscar for its eventual star Sally Field.

Unofficially adopted a 14-year-old foster daughter, Mary Luana Williams (known as Lulu), with Tom Hayden in 1982. Lulu was the fifth child of Mary & Randy Williams, a Black Panther couple Fonda met some years prior through Huey P. Newton. Lulu came to know the Haydens when she attended a summer camp they ran for disadvantaged youths in Santa Barbara in 1978.

Was listed as a potential nominee on the 2006 Razzie Award nominating ballot. She was listed as a suggestion in the Worst Actress category for her performance in the film Monster-in-Law (2005). She failed to receive a nomination, however. (Had she gotten the nomination, it would have been her first Razzie nomination in 16 years. She was previously nominated for Worst Actress at the 1990 Razzie Awards for her performance in the film Old Gringo (1989).).

In her modeling days after college, she was twice on the cover of Vogue magazine.

Her performance as Bree Daniels in Klute (1971) is ranked #91 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Performances of All Time.

She and Tom Hayden gave their son Troy Garity his paternal grandmother's last name for the sake of anonymity.

She and her father Henry Fonda are the only father-daughter couple to receive Oscars for leading roles.

A 1972 visit to Hanoi during the Vietnam war where Fonda campaigned in favor of the communist regime and the subsequent release of several photographs of her atop a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun used against American air crews earned her the nickname "Hanoi Jane." As a result of her visit to Hanoi and the accompanying photographs, many Americans continue to regard Fonda with general resentment and hostility to this day.

Visited Sweden in September 2006 to support political party FI (Feministic Initiative) in the national election. FI focuses on issues that will benefit women and is led by the previous leader of Sweden's communist party. Coincidentally, "fi" is also the Swedish military abbreviation for "enemy".

Jane Fonda was the first pick for the role of Evelyn Mulwray in Chinatown (1974), which eventually was played by Faye Dunaway. Fonda was wanted by the film's producer Robert Evans, who was also at the time chief of production at Paramount Pictures, and by director Roman Polanski and Paramount owner Charlie Bluhdorn. After lengthy negotiations, Fonda passed on the role. Evans then contacted Faye Dunaway's agent Sue Mengers and got her for the rock bottom price of $50,000, telling Mengers -- a close friend -- that he wanted Dunaway whereas everyone else wanted Fonda. Saying that he had time to intercede before Fonda signed her contract, Mengers got Dunaway to agree to the insulting offer. (Evans had explained to Mengers that after three flops in a row, Faye was a cold property.) After signing Dunaway, he told Mengers that Fonda had actually passed on the role. Mengers slammed down the phone on him. Polanski had not wanted Dunaway as his female lead due to her reputation for being temperamental, which she lived up to on the "Chinatown" shoot. She received an Oscar nomination for the role.

Was born double-jointed.

Turned down the role of Bonnie Parker, then played by Faye Dunaway, in Bonnie and Clyde (1967). Living in France at the time, she did not want to relocate to the United States for the part.

In 1984, her wealth, generated from acting, producing, and fitness videos was estimated at $50 million.

Although writers had labeled her a lapsed Episcopalian in past articles, Fonda concedes that she was actually raised an atheist. She goes to a Baptist church but describes her beliefs as being outside of established religion, with a more feminist slant, and doesn't want to be tagged with the fundamentalism that Born-Again Christianity has come to be associated with. "Some will say that because of all this I am not a true Christian. So be it. I feel like a Christian, I believe in the teachings of Jesus and try to practice them in my life. I have found Christians all over this country who feel as I do. They may not have been 'saved' yet they hum with divine spirit," she blogged in 2009.

In a relationship with veteran record producer Richard Perry since October 2008, the couple live together in Los Angeles.

She was a close friend of Gregory Peck and he frequently attended political rallies with her.

Turned down the role of Lara Antipova in Doctor Zhivago (1965) because it was to be filmed primarily in Spain for nine months. She didn't want to be away from fiancé Roger Vadim that long, but weeks later she changed her mind and informed her agent she wanted to do it. By then, Julie Christie had been signed to play Lara and the rest is cinematic history. Jane still says that of all the movies she's turned down in her career, Doctor Zhivago is the one she most regrets not doing.

Nominated for the 2009 Tony Award for Best Performance for a Leading Actress in a Play for "33 Variations".

Claimed, after the Oscar ceremony on April 9th, 1979, that the film The Deer Hunter (1978) was a racist film and that it presented the official version of the war in Vietnam.

Had hip and knee replacements. Unrelated to her workout regimen, it is a genetic condition. Both her father and brother also had replacements.

In 1994, Fonda founded G-CAPP, the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention. The foundation advocates for safe-sex education, provides teens with support personnel before, during, and after childbirth, and runs a network of "Second Chance Homes" that help teenage mothers become self-sufficient by striving to reduce repeat teen pregnancies and providing teen mothers with a safe living environment, support for long-term economic independence, and child development, parenting and life skills.

Jane's appearance with brother Peter Fonda in Spirits of the Dead (1968) marked the only time the siblings worked together in a feature. In it they play out an incestuous theme.

Was delivered via Caesarean section.

Protestors in Waterbury, Connecticut, led by a Republican political activist who was a WWII veteran, threatened to disrupt filming of Fonda's 1990 picture Stanley & Iris (1990), but when filming began she was well-received by the community, and the city's Board of Aldermen decisively defeated a resolution saying she was not welcome in the city.

A Vietnam veteran spit tobacco juice in her face after waiting 90 minutes in line to have her sign a copy of her memoir at Unity Temple Bookstore in Kansas City, Missouri. Though it was intended as a spit-and-run, Michael A. Smith, 54, was tackled by security and was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct. Fonda seemed unrattled and once the tobacco juice was wiped off, she continued to sign books without even getting up from her seat. [April 2005]

Louis Malle originally planned to direct Pretty Baby (1978), a film about photographer E.J. Bellocq, with Fonda and Jodie Foster to play the roles of Hattie and Violet, respectively. In the end, both actresses were unavailable due to scheduling conflicts, so Susan Sarandon and Brooke Shields were cast in the roles.

While writing the movie that eventually became Contact (1997), authors Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan envisioned Fonda in the role of Dr. Ellie Arroway.

The movie Swing Shift (1984) was originally written as a vehicle for Ms. Fonda. When her agent turned the movie down and Goldie Hawn took over, the project was rewritten as a partial comedy.

Was originally set to star in Jonathan Kaplan's The Accused (1988) playing the part of the A.D.A. Kathryn Murphy, with Kelly McGillis playing the part of rape survivor Sarah Tobias. Filming was supposed to begin in 1985, but due to lack of funds, the project was moved two years behind schedule, and Fonda had to drop out. Eventually, the part of Kathryn was played by McGillis and the role of Sarah eventually went to Jodie Foster, the latter who won an Academy Award for her performance.

Revealed on her website that she bathed in the ashes of her golden retriever Roxy when she mistook the contents of an urn for bath salts, not realizing what they were until she saw a bone in the water.

Named for Henry VIII's third wife Jane Seymour, from whom her mother Frances maintained she was descended.

In 1959, she screen-tested opposite an unknown Warren Beatty for the melodrama Parrish (1961); it was the first time either of them had done a screen test and they have completely different memories of their filmed kiss. Jane barely remembers it. Beatty's version: "We were thrown together like lions in a cage and told to kiss. Oh my God! We kissed until we had practically eaten each other's heads off. We thought this was all very effective." Whatever really happened, it didn't work out for either of them. The lead roles were given to Troy Donahue and Connie Stevens.

Fonda's war protests canceled the impact of her first Oscar for Klute (1971) - she was practically blackballed from the film industry until Fun with Dick and Jane (1977) brought her renewed mainstream success. None of the four movies she made in between were widely distributed. The public backlash died down as the political climate changed, and she finished the 1979-1980 season as the top ranking female box office star in the world despite a sub-rosa Hollywood campaign to ruin her respectability and spread false tales about her subversive behavior. One widely circulated fabrication had Fonda destroying the only existing negative of Stagecoach (1939) because she despised John Wayne.

Became the first major American actress to appear nude in a foreign film when she did so in La ronde (1964) and continues to break new ground onscreen by showing off her body far beyond typical age. At 51, she went topless for a love scene with 18-years-younger Jimmy Smits in Old Gringo (1989), and donned a sleeveless nightgown at 80 in Book Club (2018), with not a bingo wing in sight.

Tom Hayden was worth just $50,000 when he married Fonda in 1973 and refused to sign the prenuptial agreement her lawyer had drawn up. Jane didn't want to upset him so she dropped the issue. Much if not most of her future earnings went toward financing Hayden's lackluster political career, and in the couple's 1990 divorce settlement Hayden received an estimated $30 million under California's joint property law.

Originally was attached to play the female lead in Jagged Edge (1985). When she demanded that changes be made to Joe Eszterhas' script, the studio sided with Eszterhas and replaced her with Glenn Close.

An undistinguished student at Vassar, much of Jane's time there was spent sleeping in during the day and staying out late drinking at nearby men's universities. She dropped out after two years and went to Paris to study art, with aspirations of becoming a painter, but instructors told her she wasn't good enough. She moved back into her dad's house and got a job working as a secretary, until she was fired for refusing her boss's sexual advances. At the encouragement of her friend Susan Strasberg, she enrolled at the Actors Studio, and supported herself with modeling gigs while trying out for stage roles.

According to "Current Biography 1964," she had been under psychoanalysis for five years.

Once she was noted, like many single women in Hollywood, for "dating" homosexuals and trying to set them straight. These allegedly including Andréas Voutsinas, a drama coach who was Jane's roommate for two years, and the actor Timmy Everett, both deceased. In 2015 while promoting her Netflix show Grace and Frankie (2015), Fonda revealed that "A very famous actor who's gay - and I will not name names - asked me to marry him." Perhaps the reason she won't (or can't) give up the man's identity, is cause he's still alive.

Childhood pal of Brooke Hayward. It has been said that they were/are stepsisters, but this is false. (Brooke's mother Margaret Sullavan divorced Jane's father Henry Fonda before either of them were born.) A commenter on Jane's website asked her about Brooke, and she said they are no longer friends.

She used to have a huge crush on Anthony Perkins. When they'd rehearse in her dressing room during the shooting of Tall Story (1960), Jane took off her clothes and sat suggestively powdering her body while Tony hid his face in panic behind his script. Someone finally took her aside and told her he was gay, and she stopped trying to seduce him.

Talked to James Stewart about the possibility of playing his daughter in The FBI Story (1959) which would've been her first movie, but she expressed disinterest in the role which instead went to Diane Jergens.

Participated in the Vancouver Greenpeace Rally along with roughly 5,500 others (including Rachel McAdams) to protest oil drilling in British Columbia. [June 2015]

Only did Cat Ballou (1965) to fulfill contractual obligations yet it turned out to be the movie that established her as a box office draw.

Self-confessed member of the "Mile High Club".

With help of lawyers, she gained access to her late mother's medical records from the Austen Riggs Center in Massachusetts. The records showed that Frances Seymour had nine abortions before giving birth to Jane.

IQ of 132.

Sometimes goes by Jane S. Plemiannikov.

The heinous myth circling online that prisoners of war were killed or tortured on Fonda's account stems from two letters, purportedly written by Vietnam veterans, that were posted on hate sites in the late '90s. (In précis claiming soldiers listed as missing in action slipped Ms. Fonda tiny pieces of paper with their social security numbers so to identify themselves to American authorities - only for her to hand the pile of notes to a North Vietnamese commanding officer who ordered beatings for the men in question.) The claimed authors of these letters, Colonel Larry Carrigan and Air Force pilot Jerry Driscoll, have repeatedly denied both writing the letters and the incidents the letters describe. In truth, Fonda only met with a single group of seven POWs while in North Vietnam, and none of them corroborate this libelous fallacy. Fonda actually brought mail for imprisoned U.S. servicemen with her to Hanoi and returned to the United States carrying 241 letters from American POWs back to their families. She even called the wives of some of the men she met with to provide them with updates about their husbands.

Owner of a Coton De Tulear named Tulea.

Received $2 million from Columbia Pictures in 1979 to appear in a prison movie to be called "Her Brother's Keeper" whether or not it was ultimately made, which it wasn't. Such an arrangement is known informally as a pay-or-play contract.

Hosted the Bank Exit rally in L.A. on her birthday in 2016 with special guests Frances Fisher, Dolores Huerta, Catherine Keener and Lily Tomlin to decry 17 banks funding the Dakota Access Pipeline Project and publicly divest her money from Wells Fargo. She was treated to a topical birthday cake upon which the iconic promotional image of herself in Barbarella (1968) was renamed "Bankarella" and embellished with an ironic shower of dollar bills.

Fonda has put the Beverly Hills home she bought in 2012 up for sale and just purchased a newly constructed townhouse in Century City for $5.45 million, in cash. One of her new neighbors is Bob Newhart. [April 2017]

George Tuttle Brokaw, her mom's second husband and the father of her half-sister Pan, drowned in a sanitarium swimming pool in 1935, drunk from liquor he'd snuck onto the grounds. Before that Frances had already been married to and divorced from an Austrian count. Thus, Henry Fonda was her third husband when she married him in 1936, aged 28.

Resided in an extremely modest - by movie star standards - $45,000 house at 152 Wadsworth Avenue in Santa Monica for more than a decade, as then-husband Tom Hayden forbid the family from displaying any signs of outward wealth. (He couldn't stand looking at Jane's Cartier watch, so she changed it to a Timex.) She had to put wire over the windows because so many people threw things, especially rotten eggs. Sent her kids to public school, and drove an inconspicuous Volvo, which she checked for bombs every morning.

Merchandise featuring her clench-fist mugshot from 1970 include T-shirts, clutches, tote bags, mugs, refrigerator magnets and computer mousepads. The image was used as the poster for the documentary Jane Fonda in Five Acts (2018) and appeared on a billboard in Time Square.

Hands and footprints were enshrined at Grauman's Chinese Theatre. [2013]

The initials of her production company, IPC Films, initially stood for Indochina Peace Campaign. The meaning was later changed to International Pictures Corporation, then retitled Fonda Films when she cut ties with business partner Bruce Gilbert and teamed with Lois Bonfiglio.

At the 2014 National Sex Ed Conference, Jane Fonda claimed to have been one of the first women in the United States ("if not the first" in her words) to have a spiral-shaped plastic IUD inserted and therefore, unlike many sexually active teenagers in the 1950s, she never unintentionally got pregnant. Fonda proudly added that she used her family connections to arrange safe abortions for friends in need at distant locales such as Cuba and Switzerland, or in some cases domestically at a very private and expensive clinic.

An early audition was for the role that went to Natalie Wood in Splendor in the Grass (1961). When director Elia Kazan asked her if she was ambitious she said no, reasoning to herself: "Good girls aren't supposed to be ambitious." Jane believes Kazan would've given her the part if she'd answered yes.

Insecure about her looks during adolescence, she felt confident to pursue acting after Greta Garbo said "Well you're pretty enough!" at a star-filled bash thrown by her dad on the French Riviera, circa 1957.

Has disregarded television indecency standards without being censored at least three times, notably in February 2008 when she said the 'c' word on Today (1952).

Caught Ted Turner cheating one month after their wedding, prompting Fonda to hit him repeatedly with a car phone and pour a bottled beverage on his head.

Honored with the prestigious Gold Hugo Career Achievement Award from the Chicago International Film Festival. [July 2017]

Fonda occasionally hobnobbed with Donald Trump during her marriage to CNN founder Ted Turner, but today she is an outspoken critic of the now-President, even though he's given money to her nonprofit organizations.

Received the Golden Lion lifetime achievement award by the Venice Film Festival. [September 2017]

Good friends with Lily Tomlin, who starred with her in Nine to Five (1980) and now on the Emmy-nominated series Grace and Frankie (2015), portraying frenemies whose husbands leave them after a 40 year marriage ...for each other.

Her mother worked as a secretary on Wall Street for Morgan Guaranty Trust Company, the bank that later turned over all of Jane's files to the FBI without a subpoena.

Breastfed her daughter Vanessa Vadim until she was 3 weeks old due to suffering from post-natal depression following a forceps delivery. She did, however, go on to breastfeed her son Troy Garity for the first 2 years of his life.

In 1978, four years into recovery from bulimia nervosa, she also gave up smoking, an unhealthy habit that has resurfaced from time to time. As recently as 2015 paparazzi snapped her taking a drag at an outdoor café in Paris.

Sound clips of Fonda in character as prostitute Bree Daniels from Klute (1971) were featured in the song "Wings of Desire" by New Zealand band Strawpeople. Song was later made famous in the Nicole Kidman movie To Die For (1995).

She participates in discussion with her fans on janefonda.com where comments are moderated by a site administrator. On regular social media she won't even bother in view of constant vulgar attacks. She told HARDtalk (1997)'s Stephen Sackur that haters send her messages like "I want to urinate on your grave" all the time.

Breast cancer survivor.

Was born at Manhattan's now closed Doctors Hospital on East End Avenue.

When the actress brought her dog Tulea to Wallis Anneberg Center's Lovelace Studio Theater to catch Saffron Burrows's one-woman show "Jackie Unveiled", nobody at the 150-seat theater had the heart (or guts) to tell Fonda that pets were not allowed. [March 2018]

Said that Book Club (2018) is the most fun she's ever had on a movie and cited her co-star Don Johnson as the most attractive actor she's worked with.

Received the Female Lifetime Achievement Award at the Environmental Media Association (EMA) Honors Benefit Gala on June 9, 2018 for her efforts to make a difference on the planet.

Three generations of Fonda ladies - Jane's mother Frances, herself, her daughter Vanessa Vadim - each had kids by more than one man.

One of 400 theatrical persons who signed a petition supporting the trip of a delegation from the Women Strike for Peace organization to the disarmament conference in Geneva. [1962]

She was the odds-on favorite to win the Best Actress Oscar for her lacerating performance in They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969), so it came as a surprise when she lost to Maggie Smith for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969), a commercially less successful film. It was speculated that Fonda's March 8, 1970 arrest on Fort Hood military reservation, as well as rumors of drug use and adultery recently prior thereto, had cost her the award.

Supported the Indian occupation of Alcatraz, 1969-71, defying a Coast Guard blockade to deliver supplies to militants who'd taken over the island.

[regarding her visit to Hanoi] It hurt so many soldiers. It galvanized such hostility. It was the most horrible thing I could possibly have done. It was just thoughtless.

I, a Socialist, think we should strive toward a Socialist society, all the way to Communism.

[speaking to students at the University of Michigan in 1970] If you understood what Communism was, you would hope, you would pray on your knees that one day we would become Communist.

People think actresses find public speaking easy, and it's not easy at all; we're used to hiding behind masks.

[accepting her father's Oscar for On Golden Pond (1981)] I'll bet when he heard it just now, he said 'Hey ain't I lucky?' As if luck had anything to do with it.

[on the infamous photo of her posing with a Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun] The biggest lapse of judgment in my life. I don't regret going to North Vietnam. I'm glad I went. I'm glad I did everything I did, except that.

I don't know if I was set up or not. I was an adult. I take responsibility for my actions . . . These soldiers sang a song; I sang a song in feeble Vietnamese. Everyone was laughing. I was led to a gun site and I sat down. And I was laughing and clapping, and there were pictures taken . . . I understand the anger about that.

I would have given up acting in a minute. I didn't like how it set me apart from other people.

When I start down a path that I know is the right path, I go with all of me.

I'm a very brave person. I can go to North Vietnam, I can challenge my government, but I can't challenge the man I'm with if means I'm going to end up alone.

It's hard to imagine a happy ending to the US-led war in Iraq. What's it going to mean for stability as a nation, for terrorism, for the economy I can't imagine. I think the entire world is going to be united against us.

Ted Turner needs someone to be there 100 percent of the time. He thinks that's love. It's not love. It's babysitting.

I wanted to do a tour like I did during the Vietnam War, a tour of the country. But then Cindy Sheehan filled in the gap, and she is better at this than I am. I carry too much baggage.

When I left the West Coast I was a liberal. When I landed in New York I was a revolutionary.

[on Henry Fonda's love of the theater] I'm becoming obsessed with his presence in my head, because my dad adored theater. He didn't talk much, but he would talk about how he loved the immediacy of a live audience. I was never comfortable enough in my own skin 45 years ago to be able to understand it. I just wanted to escape. And now it's like, 'Oh Dad, I wish you were here and alive, so I could say to you: "I get it! I'm finally able to experience what you were talking about."

[why she quit acting while married to Tom Hayden] When I was really, really unhappy with myself and my life, which happened in the second half of my marriage to Tom, I just stopped. Acting became too painful. I just couldn't. All the joy leached out of it.

[on returning to the stage in 2009] I am not the same person I was. I really am a different person. And I feel now that I could really be better than I have ever been in acting. It felt like something I had left prematurely. I didn't complete it, and I wanted to see if I could find joy in it again. It's been 45, 46 years since I was last on Broadway, and it feels like it too, in the sense of my personal trajectory. I feel that in terms of my personal development there has been at least half a century in there. Thank God.

It's always great to rehearse on a plane because people think you're mad.

Emotionality is really easy for me. My father always said that Fondas can cry at a good steak.

[6/08, on dating] I want someone who is not only a great lover but who is also an old soul. Older men seem to think they are riding the crest when they decide to cash in and take it easy once they have hooked up with me, which becomes a burden and a bore.

[on her book 'Prime Time'] I actually never lead. There's always something more first, and then I'm the cheerleader. There are many, many books about aging. Mine just covers everything that I wanted to know.

I viewed my mother as a snob. Well she was a snob. Had she lived long enough I probably wouldn't have cared for her very much, frankly. So the way I protected myself from that is, 'Okay, I don't need you'. But of course I blamed myself when she killed herself.

I try to live my third act in such a way that I won't have regrets. You never get there entirely, but you can spend your life working at it.

[on third husband Ted Turner] For his own reasons, Ted moves laterally through life, very fast. Across his millions of acres. I wanted to go vertically. I knew if I stayed with him I'd be safe, I wouldn't need to work, and it would be interesting. But I would never be a whole person, and I wanted to be a whole person.

I took Klute (1971) because, in it, I expose a great deal of the oppression of women in this country - the system which makes women sell themselves for possessions.

Aging is not what we used to think it was, where you peak at middle age. It's ascending a staircase into growth, wisdom, well-being and happiness.

I have used acupuncture many times in the past - to reduce fever, heal broken bones, relieve pain... it really works if the doctor is skilled. I have felt I needed to have my energy system balanced.

It's never too late - never too late to start over, never too late to be happy.

[seminar broadcast on C-SPAN in 2005] Our leaders today are not paying attention to the fundamental rule of warfare: Know thine enemy! We didn't know the Vietnamese and we thought it would be a cakewalk going into Iraq and we didn't understand who they were. It comes from hubris and arrogance, the omnipotence of America. Nobody's number one forever. Not individuals and not nations. Sooner than later everybody crashes. I hope we don't crash in hostile territory but we're certainly headed that way.

[about David R. Slavitt's bestselling novel "The Exhibitionist"] I don't read trash. Is that that book that everyone says is about me?

I feel like my honesty gives people the freedom to talk about things they wouldn't otherwise.

[asked why she accepted her Oscar for Coming Home (1978) in sign language] Because I found out there were 17 million deaf people in the United States and the Academy Awards were not closed-captioned. I tried to get them to close caption and they wouldn't do it. So I decided to do my thing in sign language.

Roger Vadim and I were too different to last. I don't mean nationality, I mean attitude. I think opposites only attract for a brief, intense period.

The kind of parts that I think are the most exciting to play and are the most viable in terms of communication are characters that are complex; that is, characters that are full of contradictions that can be shown, that are in motion, that are trying to deal with problems that are real to people.

As an actor you spend all your life trying to do something they put people in asylums for.

To overcome bulimia, I had to teach myself to eat all over again, like a child.

[reflecting on her career slump in the mid-1970s] I can't say I was blacklisted, but I was greylisted. Nixon [Richard Nixon] used the same tactics on me he used on people he didn't like in the '50s. He had conservative state legislators introduce measures that would condemn or ban my films or prohibit me from even entering the state. Conservative theater owners went along, and studio executives who might have shared my politics said, 'What can we do? Why take a chance?'

[after having her breast implants removed] My kids are so relieved. They tell me I look normal again.

I find that arduous physical labor can jump-start my thought process.

I'm vain about loose flesh. And so I'm careful that what I wear will show off my best parts.

I'll smoke pot every now and then. I cannot see a movie on pot. The number of movies I've seen thinking, This is probably the best I have ever seen, and then I'll see it again sober and think, What was I thinking?

When I was young I never thought I was going to make it past thirty. I thought I was going to die of alcoholism and loneliness and you know that hasn't been the case... Don't give up no matter how hard it is. Try to make the best of who you are.

I grew up with a deep belief that wherever our troops fought, they were on the side of the angels.

[July 2011, her reaction to QVC axing a scheduled appearance at behest of angry phone callers threatening to boycott the show if she were allowed on] I am, to say the least, deeply disappointed that QVC caved to this kind of insane pressure by some well-funded and organized political extremist groups and that they did it without talking to me first. I have never shied away from talking about this as I have nothing to hide. I could have pointed out that threats of boycotts are nothing new for me and have never prevented me from having bestselling books and exercise DVDs, films, and a Broadway play. Most people don't buy into the far right lies. Many people have reached out to express how excited they were about my going onto QVC and hearing about my book. Bottom line, this has gone on far too long, this spreading of lies about me! None of it is true. NONE OF IT! I love my country. I have never done anything to hurt my country or the men and women who have fought and continue to fight for us. I do not understand what the far right stands to gain by continuing with these myths. In this case, they denied a lot of people the chance to hear about a book that can help make life better, easier and more fulfilling. I am deeply grateful for all of the support I have been getting since this happened, including from my Vietnam Veterans friends.

The only time I ever saw Dad cry was when Roosevelt died.

I think marriage is going to go out, become obsolete. I don't think it's natural for two people to swear to be together for the rest of their lives. [1961]

I never was a hippie! I went to India because so many friends like Mia Farrow and The Beatles were going there to discover truth. And so I went and trekked through India by myself, but instead of discovering truth, I wanted to join the Peace Corps.

[lecturing at AOL Build (2014), April 2015] Sometimes all I can do when I walk down the street - and this matters especially in New York - is look people in the eye. Especially homeless people . . . and prostitutes. I mean you don't see streetwalkers so much here, but I've been in cities where you run into streetwalkers. Looking them in the eye and saying "hello" I know makes a difference to that woman's life.

Too few people can succeed as an actress or an actor. It's a very unhappy business if you've been bitten by the bug and you can't make it.

As long as someone can make a buck off me, they're gonna do it. And as long as I can go into Hollywood and make a movie and make a lot of money which I can use to support the struggles I'm involved with, I will.

It's easy to say that awards are silly, but they're very good reassurance for the ego.

[about her detractors] One of the most important things in getting older is forgiveness, letting go of hate. You can't really be a fully realized, happy person if you're harboring hate, especially hate that's based on lies! But even hate that's based on truth - you've gotta let it go. I think some people have a hard time letting go of hate because then they'll be left with pain and they don't know how to handle the pain. There's so much misunderstanding about the war in Vietnam, it's still a deep scar in our country's psyche. So it makes me sad when this manifests the way it does, and the people who keep it going are very sad people. I feel sorry for them.

I love working in French. I feel a certain kind of freedom. The way you feel when you learn to speak a foreign language and find you can say things you wouldn't dare say in English.

Some people don't like me very much and some people like me a whole lot, and there's almost nobody who's undecided.

The animal I identify with is a bear because I love to play and cavort and be social. But then I have to go into seclusion, a kind of hibernation. I feel I get all emptied out and then I have to refill. I do it either by being silent - meditating or getting close to nature - or by reading.

When a relationship ends, the pattern with me has usually been a year or two of terrible anger and then gradually remembering why I loved them in the first place while realizing that life is so short. What's the point of holding a grudge? Better to understand the role you played in it and move on.

I think it's important to live life with intention, because otherwise you're just sort of at the mercy of fate.

[from her blog post "Giving Thanks"] I wake up every morning feeling grateful that I live here and not in Syria.

I'm not comfortable with the idea of ever directing. I like to be directed. I still get frightened working, I still get cramps a lot. Acting hasn't become easier or more comfortable. I can make decisions and choices, but I never want to be the buck-stops-here person.

If I had a dream day it would be spent hiking in Will Rogers [Historic State Park] and I would come back and work out and then I would read all day long.

It doesn't matter how anybody describes me, all that matters is what I do.

There was a lot of unnecessary abrasiveness and shrillness in the '60s, especially if you were inexperienced and somewhat naive, like I was. Because I lacked confidence in myself and experience in talking publicly as Jane Fonda, I would borrow other people's rhetoric - rhetoric that doesn't suit me. In many instances, I didn't even know what some of the words meant. There must have been something that seemed false about it that I think turned people off, and I can understand it. It's not that my emotions were false, but that I sometimes chose the wrong manner in which to express them. Maybe it's my fault for being the way I am - I am impetuous, I am an extremely emotional person.

There's no question On Golden Pond (1981) helped sell my Workout program because people saw me in a bathing suit. So what?

A man is not sexy to me unless I feel he can take me to a place that I've never been.

If Trump hadn't been elected, I could have been gardening. I'm going to spend my 80s at the barricades again. It's not what I expected.

[on the ever persistent controversy of her trip to Hanoi] I'm a lightning rod. I am Henry Fonda's daughter and a woman, so I understand I'm an easy target. It's easier to hate me than to hate the people responsible for sending those men over there.

I took Prozac to get me through a bad patch in my late 40s. Many of my friends who are on anti-depression meds have had to try different things before finding the one that works. And, of course, when the problem is more complex as with bipolar or chronic depression mixed with bipolarity, there may need to be frequent adjustments and "cocktails" of different meds. Some depression can be treated with cognitive therapy. But for many, cognitive therapy alone, without meds, won't work. Unfortunately, those with the most severe mental health problems are the very ones who, when they start to feel better, refuse to keep taking the drug. Some decide on their own to increase the dosage. My experience is that one should go to a licensed psychopharmacologist, get diagnosed, begin to take the prescribed medication and stick with it until it is proven not to work, or the side effects offset the benefits or one no longer needs the meds. Cognitive therapy in combination with the appropriate medication is the optimal solution although not everyone can afford that. I hope one day soon this will change. I did not mean to imply in my blog that depression is EASY to cure. It can be easy or very hard. It may require taking medication forever. But there's no question that, for many, alternative health care won't work and medication will. Patience is critical. I also meditate and work out, both of which raises ones level of endorphins and, thus, can decrease depression.

I think masturbation is really important. Use it or lose it - you know?